


to catch them if they fall

by andawaywego



Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Blood and Violence, Crime Fighting, Eventual Romance, Eventual Smut, F/F, Gonna be fighting and violence and stuff so be warned, Slow Burn, also, like it's THAT universe, lots of other stuff! idk i'm excited, superhero ban
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-12
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-19 02:08:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29992257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/andawaywego/pseuds/andawaywego
Summary: Dani is on the run and can't stop lighting up the room.Jamie talks to plants and breaks noses for fun.Worst superhero team ever.[or: Superhero AU where the world needs saving and Dani (reluctantly) answers the call.]
Relationships: Dani Clayton/Jamie, background Owen/Hannah, very background past Peter/Rebecca
Comments: 17
Kudos: 68





	to catch them if they fall

**Author's Note:**

> okay, so i've been brewing on and plotting this for like a month and finally just decided to write it. basically!! welcome to my superhero AU. i'm not sure if this has been done for this fandom before and i've never done an AU like this so i'm very, very excited and have some fun stuff in story.
> 
> i hope that you'll join me on this new journey.
> 
> read on if you dare.

..

In the swallow of darkness, in the shadow of night, a man carries a little girl over his shoulder. She is small, only seven or eight, with a black hood secured over her face. At the man’s waist, is a boy, older and hooded as well, gripping onto the man’s shirt and stumbling after him up the rough gravel to a place he cannot see.

Like the girl, he does not struggle. He simply follows obediently, silent as the whisper of wind through the trees in the far distance. If he speaks or tries to run, the man has promised to kill his sister, the girl over the man’s shoulder. If his sister speaks or tries to get away, the man has promised to kill him. This threat plays on a hitching loop through the boy’s head as they go. He cannot rid the shiver of the memory, the glint in the man’s eyes seconds before he tied their hands and threw the hoods over their heads. 

The boy isn’t certain how long ago this promise was made. All he has known for what feels like forever is darkness. He can hear the man’s heavy breathing, for his sister is small but she is not light and they have been walking for a while now. He doesn’t say a word, all the same.

Eventually, the man comes to a halt and the boy hears a shuffle of fabric and hears him huff out a small grunt of effort.

“Hold onto your brother,” he says and then the boy feels the clumsy touch of his sister grabbing the fabric of his pajamas. “And don’t make a sound.”

There’s another noise: a door being opened. The boy does not let go of the man’s shirt, so when he begins to move again, he is jerked forward and his sister, clinging to him, nearly falls. She catches herself and he wants to ask if she is okay. He wants to tell her to be brave, that this will be all over soon, but he can’t. 

So he doesn’t.

“This way,” the man gruffs, as if the children can see enough to know which way he means. He leads them along and the boy feels stiff carpet beneath the soles of his slippers. 

Another door. The man stops walking and the boy nearly runs into him. 

“Let go of me, boy,” the man says, so the boy does. “Now, I’m going to take you one at a time, your sister first. You will wait here for me to come and get you. If you move, then I’ll—”

Unwilling to hear it again, the boy nods rapidly to show he understands. He feels something brush him—the man’s arm—and then the desperate clutch of his sister’s hand releases as she is lifted up again. Creaking then. It sounds like the man is going down a set of stairs.

The boy’s heart drums steadily in his throat, swaying his body back and forth as easy as breathing. He is trembling, his lips quivering from the effort of holding back tears beneath his hood. 

How stupid he’s been, the boy thinks; _how wretched to let this happen_.

He should run. His hands might be tied, but he thinks he could yank the hood off enough to see, enough to get away. But his sister is somewhere else. And the man is very fast. More than that, the boy does not even know where he is.

How far is far enough, the boy wonders. 

And anyway, he won’t leave without his sister. So the boy straightens his shoulders and waits. He has to be strong, he has decided. He has to be strong right now.

The stairs creak again as the man returns. The boy makes a small shocked noise as he is lifted, too, though not very easily. He tries to swallow it down, certain that the man will make good on his promise now, but the man either ignores it or doesn’t hear.

If following blindly in the dark, unable to get away, had been frightening, being carried when you cannot see is a nightmare. The boy feels sick, his stomach churning around nothing. 

Once they are down the stairs, the man continues to carry him. Going and going until there is a small _clanging_ noise—a button against metal perhaps—and the boy is placed on his feet again. 

The hood is yanked away from his face and the light, however dim, momentarily blinds him. He blinks blearily and tries to understand his surroundings. A basement of sorts, dark and dusty. A single lightbulb hanging from the ceiling in the middle of the wide space.

Here is the concerning thing: he is in what appears to be a jail cell, metal bars and all. Before him stands the man, tall and threatening, the mask he’d been wearing outside the school gone. At first, the boy is certain it’s a trick of the light, but with dread sinking his lungs and legs, his vision clears enough to understand that it is not.

“Peter?” he asks, only realizing a moment too late that he has broken the rule.

For the first time, he becomes aware of his sister standing beside him. Her hand reaches out and grabs for his and she is shivering, too, and not just from the cold. Above them, Peter smiles, his lips twisting to the side to reveal clean and sharp teeth.

“Hello, again,” he says. “Miles—” a nod to the boy, “Flora—” a nod to the girl. “You can speak now. I won’t touch a’one of you.”

“Peter, where are we?” Flora asks, her voice trembling. “Are we— Are we— Is this a...Miles, I’m cold.”

Miles looks to her and then back at Peter, puffing up his chest and trying his best to look bigger than he is. “What’s going on? Uncle will be very cross when he finds out that—”

“Oh, yes, indeed,” Peter cuts in, his tone mocking. “ _Very_ cross, indeed. Trouble is, he won’t know where to find you.”

These words settle chill in the air and Miles is quite suddenly without anything to say. He takes a step back, bringing Flora with him, trying to get away. Peter, seeing this, takes a step back of his own, and then he is outside the bars and swinging a door into place. From his pocket, he pulls out a key and locks them inside the cell.

“It’s a game,” he says. “Only a game. A sleepover.” He nods to the starchy cots in the corner of the small cell. “So get some sleep.”

“I don’t want sleep!” Miles yells, releasing Flora’s hand to go to the bars of the cell and grip them, shake at them, find them too sturdy to move. “I want to know what’s going on! This isn’t a game and you can’t just keep us here.”

Peter shrugs, unshaken. “Sure, I can.” He turns on his heel, hands in his pockets; the portrait of steady nonchalance despite the situation. 

“Uncle will—” Miles begins.

But Peter laughs, cutting him off. A terrible sound. Unlike any laugh Miles has ever heard before. Frightened again, he steps away from the bars. 

“Your uncle,” Peter says, turning back to look at them, “will get you back. So long as he does what he’s told.”

“What do you mean?” 

It’s said in a whisper. A terrified thing. Miles feels very sick again.

Peter doesn’t answer. In a moment he’s standing in front of the cell bars again, this time crouched down so he is more level with the children’s eyes. He looks between them, as if he is trying to memorize how desperate and frightened they are. This was a man who they once knew. He played games with them and bought flowers for Flora. He took them on car rides and walked with them through the neighborhood whenever they were on leave from school and their uncle was busy. 

Once he looked at them in warm familiarity. But there is none of that now. It has been replaced by something distant, cold. Looking at him now is like trying to peek through a keyhole into a room that’s only known darkness.

Miles has time to be afraid again. He has time to hold Flora near as she cries and waits for something to break. And then Peter snaps his fingers and they each fall into the warm embrace of sweet stupefaction.

________

Dani steps out into the gentle sunlight of early afternoon and takes a deep breath. She closes her eyes to the bustle of the world for a moment, breathing it in, grounding herself, and then she opens them, turns to her left and starts walking.

It’s the same thing every morning. She wakes up in her stiff, hostel bed and lets recollection cut her deep. Those things she spends most days trying not to think about drift heavily around her room, bumping against the walls and begging to be let out. So she opens the window. Looks out at the city and focuses on her breathing. Closes her eyes. 

Thinks of the sky, that cool blue like ripples in a pond. Water drifting slowly, lapping against rocks and riverbeds. Going somewhere else.

It’s been working. So far, it’s been working.

There’s a newspaper stand just a block down the way. Russ, the man who works the afternoon shift, knows her by name and tips his baseball hat at her like they are meeting in another decade entirely.

“Looks like rain,” he says every time, while Dani pulls out enough money to buy a newspaper.

It never does.

But she looks up at it anyway and says, “You know, it really does.”

Two blocks after that is the cafe where she eats. Where she sits in the same seat as always and pours over the classifieds. She has a pencil she keeps tucked behind her ear as she reads, a stubby little thing that’s been sharpened too many times, and she’s a quick draw when she needs it to circle something. 

The first few hours after noon are typically spent at the phone outside her room at the hostel. It’s cheaper than the payphones and she’s been relying on coinage forgotten on sidewalks or in the cushions of the furniture in the building’s lobby to make her calls. 

Most of the time, she is told that the position she’s calling about is no longer vacant.

Sometimes, she manages to get an interview and spends the days leading up to it sick with panic and trying to calm down. The last thing she needs is another outburst to happen in some poor person’s office. London is nice and far from her home in the States, but they are stricter about these things. She has a feeling she would never have the _chance_ to go home even if she wanted to if she did something stupid like let her emotions get the best of her.

“You look nice today,” says Russ at the newspaper stand, leaning forward to take a look at her blazer and skirt—the heels that make her feel that she’s in danger of falling over with every step. “Big date?”

Dani laughs as he wiggles his eyebrows harmlessly. “It’s eleven o’clock,” she says.

“Who knows? Could be a brunch date.”

“No, no, it’s not a brunch date.”

“What then?”

It’s strange because they don’t really know one another, but since Dani arrived in London, she is certain that no one has ever looked at her like Russ—so trusting and easy. Like they’re old friends or else have no need for masks or pleasantries. Some long lost brother from a life where she is not on the run, perhaps.

“An interview,” says Dani. “At some legal firm.”

Russ’s expression morphs into delight. “You don’t say?”

“I do say.”

“Well, good on you.” And there’s that hat tip again. “Good luck!”

As she makes her way to the street, she waves at him, calling back a happy, “Thanks!”

A change in routine is just what she needs, or so Dani tells herself as she is jostled along amongst other commuters on the Underground. Three months in London and things are getting stale. But boring is good. Boring and predictable is _very_ good. No surprises. No wrench thrown into the middle of her ticking machinery to bring everything to a grinding halt.

But it’s a good day all the same. Looking up at the building she’s heading for, dwarfed in the size of its shadow, Dani swears she can feel it.

________

It is not a good day.

Henry Wingrave is short with her. He seems hurried and unamused from the moment she steps into his office. His assistant threw Dani an apologetic look as she shut the doors behind her, but Dani doesn’t understand it until Henry takes a call in the middle of the interview.

While she is answering a question, no less. Part of her thinks that it must be a joke. Surely no one would have the audacity to do something _that_ bold.

She is wrong.

And, anyway, Henry is calling for his secretary the moment he hangs up, ignoring Dani entirely. 

“Have my car brought around,” he instructs her and the woman rushes around in scurried, panicked movements despite not seeming to know why he’s visibly shaken. “Quickly, quickly, go on.” He flaps his hands at her as she hurries away and out of sight. Finally, he seems to remember that Dani is sitting there and is polite for the first time since she introduced herself. “My apologies, Miss Clayton, but we’ll have to finish this another time.”

Well. 

There are worse ways to say it.

Dani gets to her feet, slinging her bag around her shoulder. It’s like her blood is vibrating, vision drifting in and out in flashes of light. She keeps her head down and doesn’t meet Henry’s eyes as she lets him usher her out. 

“Of course, yeah,” she says needlessly. “No trouble at all.”

“Thank you, thank you.” He keeps his hand on her shoulder while he leads her to his assistant’s desk. His assistant—Beverly, by the name on her desk—is in the middle of a frantic phone call. She doesn’t even look up as they approach. “Bev, please set up another appointment for Miss Clayton later this week.” 

Bev finally looks up and nods to him, eyes wide with some emotion Dani doesn’t recognize. 

“Bev will take care of you,” Henry says and then one more pat on the shoulder and he is back into his office. 

Just moments later, Bev hangs up the phone and calls out, “I’ve got Mike pulling around now, sir.”

Henry comes back out of his office, throwing on his blazer and giving her a nod before hurrying off to stairs. Dani puzzles over this for a moment, wonders what has happened to make the man hurry enough to forgo the elevator.

“I’m sorry about that,” Bev says after a moment, drawing Dani’s attention back. 

Dani’s vision flashes white and she looks away carefully. “Oh, no worries,” she lies, then, “I hope everything is okay.”

Bev nods with the universal expression that says: _me too_.

“When would you be free to come back?” 

The air is thrumming around Dani now. She can feel the way it sparks and bites her skin. The fluorescent light overhead flickers. “Um...Anytime would be good.”

Ripples in a pond.

Water against stone.

The smell of wet grass.

These images, thoughts, ideas are forced to the forefront of Dani’s thoughts as she breathes as deeply as she can manage. By some miracle, she makes it through the interaction unscathed, a reminder card like a doctor’s office slipped into her bag, and then she goes to the elevators. Presses the button.

Deep breath in.

Deep breath out.

The light behind the down button shutters off and then on. 

Pebble in the water. 

Boat drifting slowly.

Dani hurries to the door near the elevators and takes the same steps as Henry.

________

The Underground is too much of a risk, so Dani splurges on a taxi, even it means scraping the very bottom of her stiff briefcase to get all the money she can manage. All this will mean is that she won’t be able to call her mother this week, but that’s hardly a harsh blow. Getting the address out is a trial and a half, but she manages it all the same. 

Forehead pressed to the cool, bumping window during the drive, eyes shut against the sunlight and imagining the clouds in the sky. Her teeth chatter, cheeks and lips feeling frostbitten from the sting of electricity buzzing beneath her skin. She taps her fingers against her leg, knee bouncing up and down. Trying to fight it. Trying to keep calm.

The radio up front cuts in and out. The taxi driver rolls his fingers on the steering wheel.

“Looks like a storm,” he says. “Damn.”

Dani hums a little in agreement, eyes still shut. Static blares through the taxi’s speakers for a moment and then the music comes back on. Just a little bit longer. A little bit longer.

Rain patters against the windshield, slow at first and then picking up speed. Surprised, Dani opens her eyes for the first time since getting into the vehicle and looks outside to the street, where the water is already pooling and puddling. Rippling and rushing to the storm drains. They’re near the hostel, just a few blocks away, and she has the sudden realization that if she tries to wait even one more moment, she won’t make it in time.

Being that they are currently stuck in traffic, this is a problem.

“How much do I owe you?” she asks, watching raindrops race their way down her window.

The driver makes a face at her in the rearview mirror, but she is not looking at him. “We’re still a ways from—” 

Finally, she turns and meets his gaze, light blurring the edges of his face, the cars out the window, the people passing by, even the headrest of his seat washed out in sterile white. She’s lost control already. She can see it in the way his mouth drops open in surprise. 

“How much?” she asks again, and this time he gives her a number.

________

Dani makes it to her room somehow, running on a miracle she’s certain she hasn’t earned. The fear in the taxi driver’s eyes linger in each blink and make it all the harder to breathe. She drops her bag to the floor, thankful—not for the first time—that she has the room to herself, and falls to her knees after it. 

Palms to rough carpet, forehead bent, Dani opens her eyes and lets that bottled charge that’s been building in her chest for the last hour rush through her. At once, she feels it push through her hands, hears the _pop_ of the lightbulbs in the ceiling, in the lamps, and a few surprised cries through the walls as it spreads from room-to-room. 

It hums there for a long time, keeping Dani in a sort of dazed state, as it drains away. Something is burning. It’s the smell that pulls her out of it, makes her blink her eyes open until she can see again. Beneath her palms, beneath her knees, on every contact zone between her skin and the carpet, the polyester is singed and steaming, turned black with a few sparks still flickering.

“Shit,” she mutters, and slaps at the carpet, trying to put it out. It isn’t until she’s managed it that she feels the pain from the burns. Pinked and furious red in places, she’s burned herself apparently, which is certainly a first. “Ow.”

Hopefully, she doesn’t get charged for the damage. It isn’t too bad, she thinks. It might have been caused by an ignorant smoker.

Bone-weary and drained, she doesn’t even bother getting back up. She simply lies down on her side beside the burn marks and rolls onto her back, looking up at the white, popcorn-textured ceiling. 

There’s more than just the carpet, apparently. More than the shattered glass on the nightstands and across the floor near her head. Every bed has been slammed into the wall hard enough to leave dents. 

Dani sighs and tries not to add up the cost of the damage in her head.

________

The pub where she eats most nights is unnaturally busy for a Monday evening. One might think the rain would drive them all home, but it hasn’t. Instead people are packed around the bar and in the booths. A mass of bodies that almost drives Dani back out the door the moment she is faced with being part of it. But she is tired and wrung out from the afternoon and the hostel wasn’t an option at the moment. 

One of the custodians there had been going around replacing lightbulbs in the rooms, saying something about a power surge and urging everyone to pretend it didn’t happen. Having never been a very good liar, Dani has decided that the pub is her only escape.

Thankfully, there is still a stool open at the bar and she takes it eagerly. Orders a drink and takes too large a gulp of it once it arrives. Presses her stinging palms to the cool glass and letting the condensation offer its petty relief. 

She is trying not to think about it.

It hasn’t been going very well.

But she does feel less buzzing, less building. Expelling so much of herself in one outburst seems to have calmed her down considerably. 

The TV in the corner of the pub is playing the news. A weatherman moves around in front of a map of the city, pointing to different sections with animated motions. After a moment, it returns to the main anchors’ desk. A picture appears in the corner of two young children, a boy and a girl, smiling at the camera with their arms around one another. It’s too far for Dani to read the banner beneath it, but she knows that the happier the picture, the sadder the story. 

She looks away.

“Probably one of those freaks,” says a man nearby. 

“Nah, probably just someone who hates the bloke,” says his companion. “Not hard to do, mind you.”

“No, it’s retaliation. Damned company funneled all that money into that task force when the crack-down started. Whoever it is, hope he tears that fucker a new one.”

“It’s kids, John,” the other man says. 

Dani watches as the first man shrugs. “It is what it is.”

And she doesn’t have to know what they’re talking about to have lost her appetite entirely.

________

Every night like clockwork, she leaves the pub at nine and makes her way back to the hostel. She doesn’t look up at anyone who passes her by. Doesn’t stop for anything other than cars at the intersections. 

She does not pass _Go_. She does not collect two-hundred dollars.

The point of all this is that she’s avoiding trouble. Move fast, keep to yourself, and you’ll make it home in one piece. Or so the supposition goes. It isn’t that she is afraid of what someone might do to her. No, that doesn’t worry her at all.

It’s herself that she’s scared of and after a day like the one she’s just lived, she is certain that this fear is justifiable.

But there is safety in routines. There is safety in staying out of sight. This is something she has been learning and relearning in the months that she’s been here, slowly running out of money. There is safety in imagining that pond, that taste of wet grass at the back of her throat. 

If she does not think of it, she will have to think of other things and that way lies danger. Grief. That biting reality that she’s been running from all this time.

She is almost at the hostel—one block away really—when she hears voices, angry and pitched a bit too loud, coming from the mouth of an alley. A knot of dread falls to the pit of her stomach and she is, rather suddenly, a woman possessed by something else.

Maybe some _one_ else. 

Because she knows she should probably ignore this. That it’s not her place to intervene if there is something going on. _This_ is what she’s been avoiding. _This_ is what she’s trying to hide from, and yet—

Down the dark, wet alley a block from the hostel, four figures are standing, three of them facing one. A glint of something she can’t quite see and the shape of a familiar hat as the man being cornered takes a step backwards, pressing into the wall.

A knife, she realizes; a knife and Russ.

It’s not her place. She is not this person.

But she has heard stories ever since she was a little girl. An era of masked men and women, cleaning up the streets of criminals, murderers, and everything in between. Supporting the less fortunate. Saving those in need. Before the bans spread, threading poison from place to place, country to country, there were books and movies. Radio programs and Halloween costumes. 

People with more control than she has, who were braver than she is, and risked themselves for the sake of others. But all that risk is what got them in trouble. It’s why she has to hide, why she spends most of her days expecting the end to come at any time.

She should go. Really, she should.

But she can’t. Tired or not, alone or not, frightened or not this is Russ, the only person she has met in a long time with real kindness in his eyes. And she can’t let him stand alone.

The men don’t notice her until she’s almost upon them, coming up with shaky steps that she tries to make seem purposeful. The hood of her rain jacket drips water in front of her eyes, but she sees the exact moment they notice her anyway.

“Well,” one of the men says, showing his teeth, “who have we got here?”

“You lookin’ for something sweetie?” another one asks, and his voice makes Dani shiver.

Russ squints through the rain, and then shakes his head, finally understanding. “Dani,” he says. “Just go.” 

The third man, the one who hasn’t spoken, flashes that damned knife again and Russ flinches, takes another step back.

“You’re with him?” the first man asks, those dirty teeth still on display. He nods to Russ and then whistles through his teeth. “Gotta say, honey, I think you could do better.”

“Yeah,” chimes in the second one as the third edges closer and closer to Russ. “How about we ditch the boyfriend and you come with us?”

Up until now, her tongue has been tied in the same knot as exists in her stomach. Her chest is tightening and tightening and she knows what is coming, what is building up again. Her hands tremble from the effort of holding herself back. 

“Wallet,” the man with the knife says, thrusting it closer to Russ’s stomach.

Russ fumbles with his jacket to comply. “I-I just have to—”

“Shut up.” The man steps closer.

The first one continues to circle Dani, raking his eyes up and down her body in a way that makes it impossible not to imagine them as his hands. 

“Leave him alone,” she says in the steadiest voice she can muster.

The man tugs her hood away and the rain splatters across her face, making her blink in surprise. “What’s that?” he asks. “Didn’t quite hear ya’.”

“Leave him alone.”

As she speaks, she is looking only at Russ, who is shaking his head in these slight movements even as his back is pressed against the wall. 

“And why should I do that?” 

His breath smells like rubbing alcohol, brushing across her damp face. That heat inside of her makes her feel brave, even as she is terrified of what is going to happen if it _snaps_. She turns to him, wiping her hair out of her face.

“Because,” she says, “I don’t want to hurt anybody.”

The man laughs. Even throws his head back into it, but Dani stands her ground, her fingertips sizzling away rainwater dripping from them. “Is that so?” He takes a step back to size her up entirely—her in her pink rain jacket, sopping wet blonde hair dripping around her shoulders, jeans darkened from water, and beat-up sneakers standing in a puddle. She imagines that she looks very far from intimidating.

But, then. That’s all the better.

“Yes,” she tells him. “So leave him alone. Just take your friends and leave.” She nods back at the mouth of the alley. “And no one will get hurt.”

Another laugh. The three of them look between one another, disbelief ringing clear and echoing against the bricks on either side. There’s a pull in Dani’s hands; there isn’t another word for it. A few feet away, an overflowing metal garbage pin rattles against pavement.

“You know what, love?” He takes a step forward. “I don’t think I believe you.”

“You should,” Dani tells him, her eyes filling with light. She has never seen her reflection when this happens, but she can imagine it’s quite the sight. 

The man certainly looks caught off guard, as do his companions. Even Russ has stopped panicking about his situation enough to watch her in open-mouthed wonder.

Before anyone can say anything else, another voice rings out—lighter and clearer than any of the others. Dani feels the sound of it rush through her like a gust of icy wind. 

“Oi!” it says. “How about we listen to the lady?”

It’s a woman in dark clothing, her brown hair slicked back from the water. She blinks away the rain as she looks between Dani and the men. She’s remarkably pretty, even in a situation like this. Dani is certain she’s never been so caught off guard in her life.

In a movie or one of those cheesy comic books from days gone by, Dani is certain the thugs would say something smart so that this woman could say something _smarter_.

 _What if we don’t_ , perhaps, and then, _Why don’t I show you_?

But the men are still shaken from Dani’s appearance. The dumpster nearby rumbles and creaks as it slides towards them. Still, they stand their ground for a moment.

The woman is closer now, standing directly beside Dani like this is something they planned, like they already know one another. Russ, if possible, looks just as confused as Dani feels. Even through the building _rush_ in her veins, she can feel her heart thundering in anticipation.

“Get out of here, ya’ lugs,” the woman says and one of the men snarls in response. A reflex, perhaps, to being told what to do by someone considerably shorter than him.

Before he can say a word, the woman winds up a fist and punches him in the jaw. What happens after is a blur that Dani has trouble making sense of.

The man that’s been hit falls back from the force of it, crying out as he goes. In the few seconds it takes for everyone to register this development, Russ has time to rush the man with the knife and the woman has the chance to kick the other man in the knee. 

A sickening _crack_ sounds through the alley, and the man yells in pain as he is staggered. “You _bitch_ ! What the _fuck_ is your—”

The woman punches him, too.

She stands there, fairly helpless, as she watches this strange woman move with the agility and strength of someone much larger. The men manage to get a few hits in, but she easily goes between them, landing punches and hits so quickly that they are on the ground in less than a minute.

“Hey, blondie,” the woman says as the men groan on the ground below her feet. “Just gonna stand there?”

Dani isn’t sure what she’s supposed to _do_ . She hadn’t planned for this; how do you _plan for this_? She jolts forward, towards Russ who is still struggling with the last man standing, making pained noises as his back hits the bricks in the fight for the knife. 

The woman moves forward, yanking at the man’s shoulders, trying to tug him back, but the next thing happens before she can:

Another glint of sharp metal, a hand drawing back, and then the man plunges the knife into Russ’s stomach.

Russ slumps back, his expression twisting with agony, as he clutches for the place where blood is now seeping through his shirt. 

The man is finally pulled away and tossed to the ground. The woman stomps on his hand, making him cry out and release the knife, which she kicks away. As this happens, Dani is rushing forward, grabbing Russ in her arms as he falls to his knees.

“Russ? Russ,” she hears herself say. “It’s okay, it’s okay, just—”

She presses her hands over his, trying to put _pressure_ on it ( _you put pressure on it, right?_ ) but the burst of red on the pale of her skin makes her dizzy, makes her—

She whips her head around to look at the man, lying on the ground. The woman stands a little to the side of him, clearly having gotten in a good enough to know he’s not going anywhere. 

It isn’t like before. Not like the burnt carpet and or the shudder of electricity flushing out from beneath her skin. 

No, this is like the street all those months ago—the sting of concrete beneath her hands as she collapsed from the force of it. She is beyond herself. She is _not_ herself; some force of energy claws itself out of her body in a blast of _something_ that nearly knocks her over. Something she has never felt before this moment.

She is sure of it.

One moment, the man is just lying there. The next, the dumpster from the back of the alley is rushing forward and slamming into him, into the other men. It happens so quickly that it’s hard to keep track of where the men even are anymore.

The woman, having jumped out of the way just in time, stares down at Dani in shock. Dani can see the flash of her own eyes in the puddles below her knees. It doesn’t fade, doesn’t go away, even after the moment passes. 

“Who the _hell_ are you?” the woman asks.

Dani doesn’t answer. Dani turns back to Russ, who is paler and paler. “Russ?” she asks. “Can you hear me? Stay awake, okay? Just stay awake.” She turns back to the woman. “We need to get him help.”

The woman blinks. Somehow, even split-lipped and stunned, she is the loveliest thing Dani has ever seen. “I don’t, I...He…” 

There’s noise at the mouth of the alley, people talking and gathering in groups, trying to see what’s happened. Dani blinks water out of her eyes as blood flows over her fingers and Russ struggles to maintain consciousness. Out on the street, blue lights flash closer and closer, a siren droning nearer.

“We have to go,” is what the woman says next. 

“I’m not going to _leave_ him,” Dani argues, appalled at the thought.

Russ is bleeding out in her arms and this stranger wants them to run.

“The cops are coming, yeah? Bet they’ve got an ambulance too. He’s gonna be fine. You and me? Not so much.”

“What do you—” Dani begins, trying to let what she’s being told settle in a bit. Her eyes are still glowing. She’s certain of it. And she doesn’t have to try to know exactly what she means.

“Not sure if you noticed, blondie, but those men?” The woman shakes her head and spares the dumpster behind her a wary look. “They’re not exactly…” She trails off. No need to finish. “And you’re covered in blood and... _glowing_ and they’re gonna lock you up for a very long time if they catch you like this. So we have to go.”

And despite all of those things being true, Dani still says, _“No_. We’re not—”

But Russ squeezes her hands, pulling her attention back. “ _Go_ ,” he whispers harshly. “Go.”

She wants to argue. Really, she does. But the woman is reaching down and pulling her arm, dragging her to her feet and toward the back of the alley just as the crowd on the sidewalk parts and a few uniformed officers come rushing in.

“You heard the man,” she says. “Now come on.” 

The last thing Dani sees before she lets herself be dragged around the corner—out and away—is Russ, slumped against the wall. Broken and bleeding in the rain.

..

**Author's Note:**

> bum bum bummmmmm.
> 
> title is a quote from my boyfriend, Superman.
> 
> hmu on [tumblr](https://andawaywego.tumblr.com/). i'm so hype about this. maybe you are too! either way, let me know if you yelled!


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